“The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, peculiar to myself and to a few other solitary men, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence. When we examine the moments, acts, and statements of all kinds of people—not only the grief and ecstasy of the greatest poets, but also the huge unhappiness of the average soul…we find, I think, that they are all suffering from the same thing. The final cause of their complaint is loneliness.”[46]

Given the pervasiveness of such terrorism in this most civilized of countries, one welcomes the efforts of Sabino S. Acquaviva, sociologist at the University of Padua and Visiting Fellow at All Souls, Oxford, to cut beneath the surface and to try to reach its underlying causes. He has undertaken to explain the ideology of the radical left in his Guerrilla Warfare and Revolutionary War in Italy and to trace its social psychology in The Religious Seed of Revolt. The two books overlap and in a sense have their unnamed subject in Toni Negri himself, one of those “clamorous cases of people,” as Acquaviva puts it, “who began with a militant commitment to Catholic Action only to end up, in the space of a few years and via complex and troublesome intellectual odysseys, as militants or theoreticians in armed revolutionary groups.”

1. Acquaviva claims that one element of continuity between the Catholic ideology these activists abandoned and the revolutionary one they embraced is found in their strong sense of moralism. I recall that some time ago a young revolutionary who still claimed to believe in God told me:

“Some big politician wanted that highway built [near Padua], and it cost 1.5 trillion lire that could have been used for cardiac or dialysis centers which we still don’t have…. But the highway was worth more votes than a hospital or cardiac center, and therefore someone who could have been saved is dying because that road was built. Now who is the worse killer? I who shoot that politician and maybe prevent his crime from being repeated, or that politician who kills every day?”

2. Acquaviva finds a second element contributing to Autonomia in the crisis of identity that Italian Marxism has suffered in its long march from postwar Stalinism to present-day revisionism. Especially since 1973, when the PCI came out for the historic compromise with the Christian Democrats, many Italians have come to see the Party not as an adversary of capitalist society so much as a component of it, a moderate force for reforming the work ethic in Italy rather than a revolutionary movement to abolish it. For the Autonomists, the PCI hardly seems the place to enact the end of alienation that they take to be the promise of Marxism. For them, only the “refusal of work,” that is, absolute opposition to salaried labor, is true to the revolutionary spirit of Marx.

3. Here enters the third element, the counterculture of personal liberation and self-fulfillment. Before it is a political movement, Acquaviva notes, Autonomia is a will to enjoy life rather than to have to earn it, a radical rejection of any society which, instead of enriching its citizens, dominates and represses them with an ethical system that insists that value comes through uncreative work. For the Autonomists the key word (it is Negri’s) has become autovalorizzazione, which can be translated as falling somewhere between self-fulfillment and self-assertion. In this concept the personal and the political meet, and more often than not Dylan pipes the tune and Marx dances.

Armando now makes ends meet on a used-car lot since losing his restaurant job, but in Shelbyville these days, he tells me, “things are hard. Everybody’s looking for jobs, but there’s no way to get a job.” Instead, he spends a lot of time thinking about moving on once again. “I’ve been thinking of going to Mexico and then running away to Canada.” He’s heard that, “If you apply you can live there with a visa,” and I don’t ask what he would do when the visa expired.

“Because this is going bad, for everybody. It’s too hard. I came with the idea that I’d make my life here—have a family, a house, a car. Be somebody, like everybody. That’s what I wanted. I don’t know if it’s my bad luck, or whatever.”

I was over at the Occupy Philly Media website; posting replies and engaging in discussion. I made some points that I wanted to re-post here:

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This movement is based on liberal values: egalitarianism, inclusiveness, etc… ; and ideally liberal solutions: corporate accountability, enforced regulations, a general push back against neoliberalism.

If you believe in these things; especially here in the US, you are a minority- in every sense of the word. Ever been to a party where you’re the only _____ in a room full of _____?

“We” simply don’t have the numbers. I’d put the number of people who “truly” support liberal values and solutions within this country at around a maximum of 15% -20% of the total population.

So as you can see this puts us up against a whole barrage of opposition from people who “kinda-sorta understand and agree” to people who want to “straight destroy everything and everyone who aren’t them”.

The left has no power outside of people and we lack the numbers and all the cards are stacked against us- institutions, culture; and capital that flows through everything, are all controlled and arranged in a way to ensure that they are reproduced; which has ultimately resulted in our present day situation.

I think we’re just going to have to wait until people suffer more within this country and are forced to endure austerity measures and other restrictions to the material aspects of people’s lives. Then maybe culture will change and people will be more open to working towards “different” solutions to the problems of our times.

Never underestimate the power of stubborn, cynical, and selfish assholes to keep us stuck in the same shit generation after generation.

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“Part of why the movement has been so important is that it has in some ways redefined what’s possible and actually opened up a visible conversation about how our political and economic systems don’t serve the vast majority of people in this country.”

I agree. We are talking; but, none of this is new…

Over the past few decades, social science research has routinely documented the trends that we are seeing and highlighting today; income and wealth inequality, increased amounts of neoliberal informed policy, stagnant wages, increased costs of higher education, etc…

“There’s definitely some kind of a political awakening going on in this country that’s neither liberal nor conservative (I certainly wouldn’t call myself a liberal, not to knock anybody who does). What we don’t know is how deep it runs and what kind of effect it will have in the long run.”

What brought people into the streets is directly related to the financial crisis and failed hope in Obama. The kicker is that even this was not enough to mobilize the left in a “mass” way… More suffering and hardship will probably be needed.

You are liberal by virtue of your interest in this movement; its just that the terms “liberal”/”progressive” have been so tarnished in the past few decades, due to the rise and dominance of neoconservatives and neoliberalism, that few want to take on the perceived liabilities associated with those terms. I imagine that the terms “liberal” / “progressive” will become more fashionable in the coming years as more and more people are unable to hold any identification with neoconservative or neoliberal policy- after all, you look silly talking about the health and interests of corporate America, especially considering their actions, when you have no money in your pockets, you can’t feed your kids or buy a house, etc…